‘Of course, this creative process takes time. About ten billion years, in fact. Since we’re in an expanding universe, it follows that its size is a function of its age. So why is the observable universe fifteen billion light years in extent? Because it is fifteen billion years old.
‘It seems unlikely, bearing these facts in mind, that life could have evolved elsewhere much earlier than it did on Earth. There are no Elder Gods.
‘So why have we come into existence? Possibly because we are an integral part of the design plan of the universe. Not accidental. Not irrelevant!
‘Each one of us is insignificant in him or her self. But as a species … Well, perhaps we should reconsider what a universe is, what it means. Without itself being conscious, it may need a consciousness fully to exist.
‘By coming to Mars, we may be enacting the first minute step of a vast process. Whether we are up to seeing the process through, well…’
‘Quite, quite,’ agreed Ben, hastily. ‘Mmm. Well… Let’s see…’
That was one of the things which set the wonderful Tom Jefferies apart. He could always hear two opposed tunes playing and make harmony from them, possibly because he had trained himself to think of unimaginably distant futures.
Of course I attended Antonia’s memorial service. I was full of grief – hers was the first death on Mars, and a man wrote an elegy on it.
At the time of the EUPACUS collapse, when we found we were stuck on the Red Planet, all hell broke loose. There was rioting, and I was witness to one incident that Tom quelled with a quick answer.
An idiot was trying to incite violence, shouting out that they must destroy the domes. ‘We’ve been lied to. Our lives have been stolen. What they call civilisation is just a sham, a stinking sham. There’s no truth – it’s all a lie. Burn the place down and have done, it’s all a big lie. Everything’s a lie!’
Tom stood up, saying loudly, ‘But if that were true, then it would be a lie.’
Silence. Then strained laughter. The crowd stood about uneasily. The orator disappeared. The domes were not destroyed.
It must be admitted, I was in despair; I was really scared of being stuck on Mars for any length of time. I took a buggy from the buggy rank without authorisation and made off into the steeps of Tharsis to hide myself away, to commune with myself, to adjust. Although I spoke with my Other, she was a nothing, a green weed floating under water. When night was coming on, I parked myself on the edge of a gully and watched darkness gather, comforted in a way by its remorseless advance, as death had advanced on Antonia.
Whatever you do, I thought to myself, the darkness is always encroaching.
A wind rose. A dust storm brewed up from nowhere. Sudden gusts slammed against my vehicle. It seemed to stagger. Then it was falling over and over, down the gully. I struck my head on a support and became unconscious, although curiously aware all the while.
In that trance-like state, the person with whom I was closest came to stand by me. She sat in a room with a wide window overlooking the Pearl River and unbound her piled dark hair. This she shook out in a dark shower, to show that she knew of my ill fortune and grieved for me.
In her hands she held a silver carp, the meaning of which I did not understand. The carp swam from her grasp, through the pure air.
When my senses returned I was confusedly aware of a pain and a light. The pain came from my right leg – or was it coming from the pinpoint of light glaring at me over a shoulder of Tharsis? Waves of pain prevented me from thinking coherently.
Eventually I managed to drag myself up. Then I realised that the light I had seen was Saturn, shining low over the rock. The buggy lay on its side against a cliff. By good fortune, it had not cracked open during the drop, or I would have died from lack of oxygen while senseless.